Wednesday, March 31, 2004

Emotional Elder Bush Attacks Son's Critics

"SAN ANTONIO, Texas (March 30) - An emotional former President George H.W. Bush on Tuesday defended his son's Iraq war and lashed out at White House critics.
It is "deeply offensive and contemptible" to hear "elites and intellectuals on the campaign trail" dismiss progress in Iraq since last year's overthrow of Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein, the elder Bush said in a speech to the National Petrochemical and Refiners Association annual convention."

Oh, fer Chrissakes.
Elder Bush is in town collecting another bushel of cash for speechmaking to rich oil guys, and what does he bitch about? The record high prices of gasoline to our nation's drivers?
Hell, no.
He's whining about his fuck-up son, and how people are complaining that he's a fuck-up.
We fail to see the progress in Iraq? What progress? Aren't Americans still dying there? Aren't we still paying out the nose to rebuild that which his son directed we tear down?
We didn't ask to invade Iraq, we wanted Bin Laden and his evil crew tracked down and brought to justice. Now we are supposed to applaud because Bush lied to us and forced our military into invading the wrong country?
Are the Bushes insane?
I find it pathetic that Dubya's daddy feels he must step forward and complain about the treatment his son and his foolhardy programs are getting.
The presidency isn't a little league team, where a daddy has to come in and defend his little slugger's bad pitching.
Just the idea that someone's father appears in public to decry his son's treatment smacks of a son who's still basically a juvenile, relying on his parents to bail him out when he's in over his head.
Sure, elder Bush pulled strings so Dubya could beat a few DUI arrests, get into graduate school despite an undergrad C average, avoid the draft by joining the reserves, start an oil company, get a hunk of a baseball team and become a governor... but when will it end?
Ask yourself-as an adult, have you ever held a job where you needed your father or mother to come in and complain about the treatment you're getting?
God, this is just embarrassing for the entire nation.
Let's just hope Dubya doesn't call in the heavy artillery- his mom.

Monday, March 29, 2004

Educating Condi

(from 60 Minutes, March28, 2004:)

ED BRADLEY::
Will the families of those people who were killed hear an apology from you?
Do you think that would be appropriate?

CONDOLEZZA RICE:
"The families, I think, have heard from this president that - and from me, and from me personally in some cases in that field in Pennsylvania or at the World Trade Center, how - deeply sorry everyone is for the loss that they endured. You couldn't be human and not feel the horror of that day. We do need to stay focused on what happened to us that day. And the best thing that we can do for the memory of the victims, the best thing that we can do for the future of this country, is to focus on those who did this to us. "

......

She just doesn't get it.
Sure, Condi, *everyone* is deeply sorry for the losses survivors of 9/11 endured.

But not everyone was in a position to avert the attacks.

Not everyone was at fault for obsessing about the long-standing family feud between the Bushes and the Husseins, instead of focusing on the clear and present danger Al Qaida presented to America.

Those who had the power to prioritize levels of threat...
Those who established where and how to deploy U.S. military troops for optimal defense...
Those who held the power to protect the homelands from enemy attacks by ensuring appropriate, advance security measures...
Those who should have made national security a priority over personal, political agendas...

Failed.

They failed, and they owe the victims and their loved ones an apology for their failure.
They had the responsibility.
They failed to accept it.
After they failed, they failed to admit they were wrong.
They compound the wrong daily by continuing to fail to apologize.

Condi can wiggle the same words around a thousand ways, but she still won't say the simple words that terrorism expert Richard Clarke said to the survivors of the 9/11 attacks:

"I apologize. I failed you, and our government failed you."

Condi, your foolish pride in refusing to admit a wrong is a cancer eroding whatever prestige or past accomplishments you have achieved.
You will no longer be remembered for your myriad achievements before you joined the Bush administration.
Now, your most memorable act will be the way you equivocated, lied, blamed, spun and otherwise tried to deflect one simple truth: you fucked up, Condi, and we all know you fucked up.

Saturday, March 27, 2004

Today's assignment was creating catchy slogans and writing "ad libbed" talking points for President Bush.
Here's what I came up with:

1. No new taxes, more tax cuts!
As long as we have plenty of reserve in the treasury, there's no need to tax the people, we can just withdraw what we need from our reserve deficits account!

2. A pessimist focuses only on results.
"Optimists for Bush" know the importance of good intentions, and nobody can deny The President's intentions have been the best.

3. Outsourcing U.S. jobs to foreign countries means giving away bad jobs Americans don't want! When the bad jobs are gone, everyone can get a job he really likes!

4. If Kerry wants to raise taxes by $900 billion in his first 100 days as president, what's to stop him from raising them 900 trillion, or $900 zillion?
His "Runaway Tax Machine" needs to stay unplugged!

5. The Patriot Act: if you have nothing to hide, what's the objection?

6. By keeping prescription costs at their current rate, pharmaceutical companies can afford to do more research. More research might soon get rid of all illnesses! Not needing to buy any medicine is the most affordable prescription option there is!

7. Let's not treat the United Nations like a noncustodial parent in a broken home.
America is not a broken home!
Let's treat the UN like what it is--a baby-sitter that helps out when the kids get bratty and mother and dad need a breather.

8. "Serving Your Nation Builds Character!"
War cuts down on teenage gang members. When misguided youth are occupied at war in a terrorist country, it's pretty hard to tag their local shopping malls or do drive-by shootings all the way from the Middle East. By "Serving Your Nation's Gang" misguided youth get hip new "gang" uniforms and legal access to firearms-weapons they use for good, not for evil.

9. What do Americans want foreigners to see? A disgruntled veteran who didn't want to be in his uniform, or a President who looks sensational in a flight suit? Optimists for Bush know the truth: a picture's worth a thousand whining, liberal, terrorist sympathizers.

10. Optimists for Bush say, "If The President was such a bad guy, why does he have more than $100 million in campaign donations?"
"Bush: the POPULAR choice."

11. Dick Clarke: American Bandstand was canceled. Bandstanding to the American people is even worse.

12. G-O-P is closer to G-O-D. Coincidence? In America's 227-year history, we know which party has been closer to Our Savior. Let GOD stay with the GOP!

13. If America is the world's melting pot, why all this liberal squawk about diversity?
Diversity creates a sad divide in our nation. The more we are alike, the more we like one another. "Let's get on the same page, America!"

14. From a humble bush grows a mighty tree.
"Bush. Even his name says environmental growth."

15. Why criticize the Bush Cabinet? Who better to run the business of government than a cabinet full of millionaire businessmen who KNOW how to make decisions that make money grow?
"For a rich America, let the rich guys run it."

16. American arrogance? It's not arrogant if you can back it up with enough fire power to blow up the entire planet. "America rules...because WE RULE!

Friday, March 26, 2004

If I Can't Beat 'Em, I'll Join 'Em

What the hell, business is slow for me and I'm a paid PR flak and corporate journalist, so I may as well start writing ads for the Bush campaign. I mean, I've memorized the style, his ad people don't have to actually believe the ad copy they write, so why not play like a Republican, ignore my own principles and make some extra money for myself?

Ad #1:
Bush on Kerry
TV:60

"Lead"

President Bush:

John Kerry said he got three Purple Hearts and a Silver Star in Vietnam. He claims he was a war hero and he makes a big deal of it like that would make him a better war president.
I make war that has made results. I have proved that.

Graphics:
Kerry with long hair, at a 1970's anti war protest, standing near Jane Fonda.

President Bush:
What John Kerry meant to say he got in the war was three purple farts, which he got from taking too much LSD with his Viet Cong lover, Jane Fonda. And his silver star? He meant to say silver car, which was a foreign car belonging to Jane Fonda, in which he rode around with her going to protests, smoking marijuana joints and planning how to turn the communists they loved into real nice guys with their own TV show in Hollywood, with the homosexuals producing and decorating it.

Graphics:
John Kerry in the Senate Chamber, at the podium

President Bush:

This tax and spend liberal wants to raise your taxes one billion, trillion, gazillion dollars in the first week he's in office so he can use all the money to pay for gay marriages and abortions for teenage welfare prostitutes on crack. You will have to get a extra job to pay all the taxes and there won't be any jobs because Kerry also wants to close businesses that are big. He also wants to make French the official language of America and move the White House to Paris so he can be with other people who look French, with long, foreign faces like him and be closer to his Taliban friends in Al Qaida who told him they want him as president, along with other evil dictators who told him that, too.

And he wants to make crack free and legal so childrens and gay prostitutes can smoke it while they solicit his White House cabinet members for prostitute sex, on company time, like my predecessor who did the same thing, only with a young Jewish intern, only she was a female. And the childrens on drugs won't want school to go to.

Graphics:
President Bush, standing at a replica of the wreckage of the World Trade Center, flanked by firefighters, holding a small American flag with soot on the edge of it.

President Bush:
When 9/11 happened, I hopped on Air Force One and raced to the West Coast in case the Terrorists were trying to fly planes into anything out there. I piloted the plane myself so I could ram into terrorists if I saw any. And I would of.
And, I felt bad for a long time after that, too. For me, 9/12, 9/13, 9/14 and 9/15 were bad too because I kept remembering the past thing, that 9/11 thing happened. And it was really bad for me the whole week as president, and for some people who lost their lifes there, too.

Then Jesus spoke to me and told me Saddam Hussein was behind the attacks so I went and got him and we are safer now that ever before in the history of the world, much less the United States which was, I believe, was here first.

But there is more to do to protect you and I am the one who has already done that, a lot.

When I see a fireman or a policeman nowadays, I still get a shiver on my pants from their bravery. And I tell them, no matter what state they served in on 9/11, I tell them they really were brave at the World Trade Center, and my administration plans to give them all a lot of extra encouragement with words all the time, if necessary. And prayers.

And John Kerry? He said firemen were lazy, dirty and smelled like smoke and he said the only smoke he likes the smell of his the marijuana smoke he and Jane Fonda like to smell in her foreign silver car. When he's not with his real rich wife, that is, and he probably only married her for all the free Heinz 57 sauce she can get for him to pour on his fancy French foods he loves to eat with his fancy liberal Massachusetts friends like Ted Kennedy and Michael Dukakis at dinners where they talk about gay weddings they went to and enjoyed a real lot.

So vote for me and let's keep being protected by me because I already showed you what I and my people in my cabinet members can do to this country, we join you in loving and protecting a real lot, no matter what it costs you.

President Bush:
I'm George W. Bush and I approve this message.
------------------------------

President Bush:
The last few years has tested Americans in several, many ways.
Some challenges it has seen before them, in the past.
And some were like no others, except even worser.
But America has arose to the challenge and I removed Saddam Hussein from Iran, where terrorism got its start, and I put a end to it.

What sees us through tough times?
Freedom, faith, families, and sacrifice.

I am asking you for four more years of sacrifice.
As long as there are still trees, still clean water, still undrilled wilderness, still jobs to send abroad to save employers money so they can hire more good jobs like I already made a lot of, as long as a puppy is cuddly, as long as little sick kids are sad, as long as old people need safe, American prescriptions, as long as people can still afford gas and still have the sacred sanctity of man/woman marriage as the Bible tells us so...as long as after-war dodgers want to turn America into a liberal, homosexual place with more taxes than before ever in the history of the whole wide world...as long as there's still deficits in the bank to pay for our freedom initiatives...

Graphic:
Jesus, holding Bush in the same pose as Mary held Jesus in "the Pieta"

President Bush:
As long as Jesus tells me to stayed on the course...
I have much more works to do.
I need you to do it with... and to.

Thursday, March 25, 2004

Snoop Bloggy Blog

Seems to me, the Bush administration is sufficiently disintegrating without my help this week, so I think it's time for a Blog that hits on a potpourri of things going on in the world, in the media and around my house.

-James, my cat, is experiencing his second kittenhood. This 15-pound puma of a cat has recently become very easily alarmed, resulting in a mess of livid, red scratches on my arms and legs from his sudden fright flights. The other day, I was rubbing his soft, white belly fuzz and accidentally grazed my wristwatch over my bedroom wall. The sound of it sent him into a panic, and he used my flesh for traction as he sped away from the traumatic event. Other than clipping his claws short, I know not how to handle this stage. He'll be 3 in August. Do they make kitty Xanax?
-Eclair and I are attending a party in Austin this Saturday, hosted by my friend Cynthia, the Texas lesbian equivalent of Richie Rich. The theme is Women in Texas History, and everyone is going as a famous Texas woman. I'm going as Molly Ivins and Eclair is going as Liz Smith. That means we can blurt out pretty near anything we want at the party, then blame it on the pundits we're impersonating.
-Has anyone noticed how high gas prices are? Did anyone join me in secretly thinking the Iraq war's only sunny spot was the prospect of getting dirt cheap gas? Jeeze, the Bush clan even fucked THAT up.
-Exercise guru Richard Simmons, 55, recently slapped a big guy at the Phoenix airport for saying, "Hey everybody, it's Richard Simmons! Let's drop our bags and rock to the 50's." Gosh, that doesn't seem like enough to make Richard want to slap the guy. Maybe he's having menopause symptoms. Richard- get some Premarin, sister.
-Color TV has turned 50. My rich neighbors had a color TV back in 1957 when I was 4. Back then, a color TV with a 12" screen cost $1,000, or around $8,000 in today's dollars. I used to toddle across the street and watch anything that was on with the old couple. Turns out, he was a transvestite and she was a Beatrice Arthur type. No wonder they liked me, I was like the little queer child they never had. My family finally got our color TV in the 60's when I was about 11. The first show we watched on it was "Batman." My stock with the neighborhood kids went up about 50 points from then on.
-Counterterrorism Czar Richard Clarke, predictably, has been catching hell from the White House. Hoping to appeal to younger voters, Condie Rice is planning to cut a music video, where she'll remix the classic, "Who Let the Dogs Out?" She'll be dressing as a Rottweiler, while White House Press Secretary Fifi Mc Clellan is backing her rap up, dressed as a teacup Poodle called "Doro." The video's director originally wanted to portray Clarke as a cat cornered up a tree, but with Bush environmental policies, he couldn't locate a tree large enough to sustain the weight of a cat.
-Perennial scofflaw Bobby Brown (aka Mr. Whitney Houston) was sentenced on Wednesday to jail in Boston, for failure to pay child support to Whitney, from whom he's been separated since he beat her up in December. He's behind $60,000 for their two kids. Two kids? I thought they just had that one little girl, who unfortunately favors her slack-jawed father.
-My entertainment dreams will be coming true in September. Perched on my refrigerator door are two prime tickets to see Annie Lennox and some other act called "Sting." I had my first stalker dream last night where, as I dogged the rim of the stage, Annie looked down at me soulfully and said into the microphone, "Ladies and gentlemen, I now see the woman I want to spend the rest of my life with." In the dream, Eclair had to hitch a ride home with Anna and Brad because I needed my car to drive off into the sunset with Annie. Sorry, baby, Annie owns my heart and she's been subletting it to you. I guess I should have told you that coming in.
-Is anyone watching the Jayson Williams trial on Court TV? The former NBA superstar killed a limo driver with a close range shotgun blast while he was giving a bunch of Harlem Globetrotters and other hangers-on a drunken tour of his mansion. He's admitted he did it, at issue in the trial is whether he did it with malice or just plain stupidity. I vote both.
-Howard Stern has finally stopped perseverating on boobs and now has focused on bitching about Bush, who has the FCC Director, Colin Powell's son Michael, in his back pocket, snuggled next to his Oral Roberts prayer cards and ZigZag papers. I am not a huge Stern fan because I find his obsessive sexual immaturity creepy as hell, but he's popular with the young, male jerk-off set, so I am all for his change of focus. Go get 'im, Howard.
-Snoop Dog has a recurring role on "The L Word," playing a music empresario/pimp called Slim Daddy. His character apparently exists to eye the lesbos up and down and make little horny remarks. He's really funny in the role. I just love that skanky thug. Looks like Bette will soon be getting a little on the side with a cute carpenter chick from Venice now that her "wife" Tina has lost the baby. Jenny and Dana met at my old stomping grounds, the Palms in West Hollywood, and went back to Jenny's place to have sex. Their sex scene was a classic mismatch. Been there, done that. Meanwhile, Marina's lover Francesca (played by the terminally creepy Lolita Davidovich) has turned out to be a real seahag, leaving Marina acting out in some childishly petulant ways. Shane is now doing a married woman played by Rosanna Arquette, whose lesbian catnip daughter wants Shane really bad. Shane, didn't you learn anything from that Toto song, "Rosanna"? Up next is the cast trip to Lesbian Mecca, aka the Dinah Shore Golf Classic in Palm Springs. Midol, anyone?

Wednesday, March 24, 2004

Survivor UPDATE

Remember folks, the NCAA Basketball thing is still going on, so Survivor is on again tonight instead of tomorrow night. With the University of Kentucky (my best friend Anna's alma mater) out of the mix, please all join us in Anna's annual NCAA cheer: "Anyone but Duke."

Anyway, tonight may be a midseason recap or it could be a merger, but I'm thinking it'll be the former, so I won't make any picks for tonight.
What I will do is recap last week's episode and give my take on what's what.
Ethan was booted out of the depressing, desolate NoMoFaggo tribe last week, in a dastardly move orchestrated by Lex Luthor.
Lex, despite his very cool calligraphied "EZ" written on the card that voted Ethan out, has now fallen into the "Who the hell does he think he is?" category.
Alas, the wimminfolk left in NoMo might be too spent to have the rationale to ask that question.
With Ethan gone, that leaves the pathetic, chronically rainsoaked NoMo tribe with Kathy the wannabe defector, Shii Ann of the eternally rolled eyes, Jerri the scowling Zen goddess who's still vaginally moist from outlasting Colby, and Lex, who started this series out sort of cool and is once again turning into a guy so into control, when he talks you can see the whites all around his eyes and a big neck vein popping up.
Those four put together equal maybe one Rupert, but without his je ne sais quoi.
More like je ne sais squat for this crowd of loosahs.
Their camp looks like the Amish did the set design for an Ingmar Bergman beach movie. That gray, bleak, desolate, sparse, broken, sad little camp began with the shelter that Rupert used a subterranean sandhole design to construct.
And those were their salad days.
When Jenna from the challenge-winning ChapMyAss tribe came over to filch three things from NoMo, she took the bulk of their rice, their Hawaiian sling (aka fishing spear) and their grill. Her visit left their camp make Biafra look like a Club Med.
You gotta hand it to Jenna though, she did have the basic home training to bring to the looting a hostess gift bag, consisting of a roll of TP, a bar of soap, a single toothbrush and, what every starving camp needs, a clothing brush. I'm starting to like Jenna. She has a cute sense of irony, and the clothing brush was an especially nice touch.
Meanwhile back at ChapMyAss, Rob was strutting around like most of us do after a night of sexual exploration with a hot babe.
I loved how he waxed poetic about his new love, "Amba."
He said, "She's sweet, she's beautiful, she's funny, she has a great personality..." then (what every parent loves to hear) he added, "and, oh yeah, her ass is smokin,' too."
All puffed up, Rob slyly observed Rupert salivating over the prongs of the newly acquired Hawaiian sling and hatched his plan to try some spear fishing, too.
"Rupert looks like Grizzly Adams, but he thinks he's Aquaman," Rob said, out of the corner of his mouth.
Soon Rupert emerged from the sea with a brimming bag of little perch-y looking fish. He looked again like the old, expansive, pre-parasitic intestinal Rupert from the Pearl Islands. Our hearts filled with hope!
His pride soon was dashed when Rob emerged from the same sea shortly after, with a bigger array of larger perch-y looking fish.
Rob said, "Rupert's stock as a provida just dropped about 20 points."
Rupert winced for the camera and said, "Rob can be a good guy but he can also be a real asshole."
Despite the clash, ChapMyAss tribe in pretty good shape.
They have two Alpha dog spearfishers that ensure their people more fish than a Baptist church fundraiser. They have shelter that actually looks like it has some function. They have extra rice and a new grill.
And they have Rupert, Rob, Tom, Amber, Jenna and Alicia- whose ass, if you ask me, is smokin' far more than Amba's.
So it's six against four, and the four are hungry and beat half to hell.
Previews hint that some switcharoo will separate Amber from her beloved Rob.
Boo hoo hoo.
The producers of Survivor better do something quick, before someone in Tribe NoMoFaggo starts handing out the grape Koolade.

Okay, I said I wouldn't pick but I better hedge my bets.
NoMoFaggos stand to dump Jerri. ChapMyAss?
Alicia has no firm allies, except for her thighs, ass, arms ...and me.

Tuesday, March 23, 2004

Sometimes it's Best to Let Someone Else Tell it...

When Rupert Murdoch Calls...Condoleezza Rice Answers by John Nichols
(Published on Monday, March 22, 2004 by The Nation)

Last Friday, the Bush Administration was busy pumping up hopes that the war on terrorism was about to yield a victory: the capture along the border between Pakistan and Afghanistan of the reputed No. 2 man in Osama bin Laden's Al Qaeda network. As it turned out, Dr. Ayman Al-Zawahri was probably not among the militants holed up in the heavily fortified compounds that were assaulted by Pakistani troops and their US advisors.

But, by most measures, the prospective capture of what Administration aides described as "a high-value target" was treated as a very big deal by the Bush White House. At the same time, Administration aides were busy trying to hold together the coalition of the sort-of willing that was cobbled together to support the invasion of Iraq. With Spain's new prime minister declaring the occupation "a disaster" and threatening to withdraw that country's troops from Iraq, and with Poland's president telling European reporters that his country was "misled" about the nature of the threat posed by Iraq, the Administration has its hands full.

Surely, National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, a key player on all the fronts that were in play, had a very long list of responsibilities. No time for diversions on Friday, right? Wrong.

Rice took time out of the middle of the day to address a secretive gathering that included global media mogul Rupert Murdoch and top executives from television networks, newspapers and other media properties owned by Murdoch's News Corp. conglomerate. Rice spoke at some length via satellite to Murdoch and his cronies, who had gathered at the posh Ritz Carlton Hotel in Cancun Mexico, according to reports published in the British press.

The Guardian newspaper, which sent a reporter to Cancun, revealed that Rice was asked to address the group by executives of the Murdoch-controlled Fox broadcast and cable networks in the US. The Fox "family" includes, of course, the Fox News cable channel, which the Guardian correctly describes as "hugely supportive of President George Bush."

"Although she is not there in person, the presence of Ms. Rice underlines the importance of Rupert Murdoch's news operations to the Bush administration, which may face growing criticism that it led the country into war on false pretences ahead of November's presidential election," the Guardian account of the Cancun gathering explained.

In addition to Fox, Murdoch controls the Bush-friendly Weekly Standard magazine and New York Post newspaper, as well as 35 local television stations and the 20th Century Fox movie studio. Thanks to Bush Administration appointees to the Federal Communications Commission, Murdoch's reach is rapidly expanding in the US. In December, the FCC approved News Corp.'s $6.6-billion takeover of DirecTV, the country's leading satellite television firm.

That decision made Murdoch the only media executive with satellite, cable and broadcast assets in the US.

In other words, Rupert Murdoch is a very powerful player in the media â€“ and, because of his willingness to turn his properties into mouthpieces for the administration, in the politics of the United States. So it should probably not come as any surprise that, like the politicians in any number of countries where Murdoch has come to dominate the discourse, Bush Administration officials answer Rupert's call â€“ even when they are supposedly preoccupied with national security concerns.

Rice's willingness to brief Fox executives is especially intriguing in light of the fact that she continues to refuse to brief the bipartisan panel that is investigating the 9/11 terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States is expected to hear this week from Central Intelligence Agency director George Tenet, Secretary of State Colin Powell and his predecessor, Madeleine Albright; Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld and his predecessor, William Cohen; and President Bill Clinton's national security adviser, Sandy Berger. But Rice has rejected invitations to testify in public.

So it seems that, when the National Commission on Terrorist Attacks Upon the United States calls, the Bush Administration's national security is not available. But when Rupert Murdoch calls, well, how could Condoleezza Rice refuse?

Zipdrive comments: All this talk from the Clinton and Bush camps about "not having actionable intelligence." That didn't slow the Bush camp down with Iraq, so perhaps they ought to sidestep using that phrase. And Condi- girl, is it lying under oath that's scaring you off? Honey, once you've given yourself to the whole Bush frat house, don't worry about your lil' reputation.

Okay, folks. You know by now I plan to write about the idiot in the White House till he's gone. So let me make it fun for you.
It's time to play...

WHO SAID IT?

1. "That was a war based on lies and misinterpretation from London and from Washington, claiming falsely that Saddam Hussein was responsible for [the] 9/11 attacks, claiming falsely that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction."
A. Former Intelligence Advisor Richard Clarke
B. Jimmy Carter
C. John Kerry

2. "The United States is shouldering a greater debt burden today than it did during the Great Depression. "The total amount owed “by consumers, businesses, governments and financial institutions“ totaled $34.4 trillion at the end of 2003, according to the Federal Reserve. The economy produced $11.3 trillion of output. That makes the nation's debt triple its gross domestic product. In 1933, debt was about 2 1/2 times the GDP."
A. Arianna Huffington
B. A study by the Gabelli Mathers Mutual Fund
B. Bill Maher, in his HBO show, "Real Time"

3. "This is historic times....whether they be Christian, Jew, or Muslim, or Hindu, people have heard the universal call to love a neighbor just like they'd like to be called themselves."
A. The Rev. Billy Graham
B. The Rev. Fred Phelps
C. George W. Bush

4. "I want to thank members of the administration who are here who will be involved in the implementation of some of the initiatives outlined to the United States Congress. The Secretary of Education is here, Rod Paige, behind me. John Ashcroft is here... And, most importantly, Alma Powell, secretary of Colin Powell, is with us."
A. Dick Cheney
B. Condaleezza Rice
3. George W. Bush

5. "If a White House insider tells the truth about the Bush administration, they get screwed. When Gen. Eric Shinseki told Congress that postwar Iraq would require a large occupation force, his military career came to an abrupt halt. When Ambassador Joseph Wilson said the 2003 State of the Union speech contained bogus information about Iraq trying to buy yellow cake uranium from Niger, someone in the White House destroyed his wife's career (and committed treason) by revealing that she was a C.I.A. operative.
Former Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill questioned the wisdom of the Bush tax cuts to the rich and got canned. When he squealed to the media, he was branded a loser with a grudge.
Richard Foster, the Medicare system's chief actuary, was threatened with dismissal if he revealed to Congress the true, much higher cost of the administration's prescription drug plan.
Richard Clarke, George Bush's former counterterrorism czar and the author of the just-published "Against All Enemies" is currently being tarred and feathered by the Bush clan as a disgruntled ex employee."
A. Molly Ivins
B. Bill Maher
C. Karen Zipdrive

Answers to be revealed in the comments box after a few people take their guesses.

Monday, March 22, 2004

A Plain, Non Political, Slice o' Life Blog

Eclair and I went to see "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind" over the weekend.
While I didn't want to maim Jim Carrey for using his trademark 1,000 silly facial expressions this time, the movie still wasn't quite my cuppa tea.
Costar Kate Winslet did very well disguising her British accent, but her character was a zany, bipolarish lunatic, and women like that make me tired because I had affairs with too many of them in the past. Sanity is far easier on the psyche, believe me.
As I get older, I lose patience with movies that go in and out of the present with slick, breakneck scene changes and jarring visuals.
I accidentally got up to get coffee early into this movie and must have missed something pivotal. I came back and pestered Eclair by asking her, "Huh?" far too many times.
She loved the movie, but then she's a Gemini. She understands all that herky jerky stuff.

On Sunday night I cooked a normal, American dinner for Eclair. I made herbed chicken, real mashed potatoes, asparagus and a salad. We had dessert in bed, two tiny little Healthy Choice eclairs.
I spilled a little pastry shmutz on my linens and mentioned Blogging about getting an eclair stain on my sheets. She thought that sounded positively lurid.
A couple of lesbians, taking in a mainstream movie matinee on Saturday, then eating low carb eclairs in bed on Sunday evening.
This is why the outraged, moral right-wing feels threatened?
Please.
She didn't even stay late enough to watch, "The L Word."

"To announce that there must be no criticism of the president, or that we are to stand by the president right or wrong, is not only unpatriotic and servile, but is morally treasonable to the American public."

Reading all the headlines over the weekend makes me realize one thing.
If anyone is still supporting Bush at this stage, they may be too gullible to reason with.
If any American feels safer now that Bush and his criminal handlers have had more than three years to monkey with our national security, they may just be too stupid to get it.

Remember when I said once former Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill came out of the Bush closet to say what a crooked clown Bush was, more GOP defectors would follow?
They have.

Former top U.S. anti terrorism advisor Richard Clarke went on "60 Minutes" Sunday (and all over the media before and after then) to tell us Bush ignored terror threats that led to 9/11.
Clarke said Sunday on "60 Minutes" that soon after the attacks, Bush demanded to know whether Iraq was behind them. When Clarke told him intelligence found no link, "He came back at me and said: 'Iraq! Saddam! Find out if there's a connection.' And in a very intimidating way."
After experts concluded again that Saddam Hussein played no role, Clarke
said, his memo "got bounced and sent back saying, 'Wrong answer. Do it again.' "
As early as Sept. 12, 2001, Clarke says, Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld urged bombing Iraq despite repeated assurances from intelligence officials that the threat emanated from Afghanistan.
"Rumsfeld said there aren't any good targets in Afghanistan. And there are lots of good targets in Iraq," Clarke said on Sunday's "60 Minutes."
"I said, 'Well, there are lots of good targets in lots of places, but Iraq had nothing to do with it.' "
The White House defended the consideration of a potential Iraq link. "Given Iraq's past support of terror it would have been irresponsible not to ask if Iraq had any involvement in the attack," it said.
Clarke has served under every president since Ronald Reagan. He quit the White House in January 2003 after he was demoted to a sub-Cabinet job.
He's written a new book on the Bush clan's inepitutude and their private agendas regarding our nation's security, led, "Against All Enemies," set to hit the stands today.
Clarke summed it all up in this quote:
"I find it outrageous that the President is running for re-election on the grounds that he's done such great things about terrorism. He ignored it."

Wednesday, March 17, 2004

Can He Get Any Stupider?

Shelley sent me this from The Onion:

Bush Calls Incumbency Key Issue Of Campaign

WASHINGTON, DC-At a campaign dinner Monday, President Bush identified incumbency as the key issue in the upcoming presidential election.
"Look at my opponent's record on incumbency," Bush said.
"John Kerry is not the president at this time. That's an indisputable matter of public record."
Bush added that the American public should seriously consider whether it wants to risk electing a president who has no experience heading a nation, has never resided in the White House, and does not have even one State Of The Union address under his belt..."

Oy vey.
There comes a time when someone makes so many ludicrous statements, it's hard to come up with new ways to say how fucking stupid he is.
Ordinarily, I'd think this was made-up, but I have heard Bush speak too many times and it sounds exactly like his brand of extemporaneous speech.
It may be sniveling to take offense just because Bush doesn't realize that the word incumbency simply means "in office," but these kind of moronic proclamations just irk me.
Why? Because people don't connect dimwitted remarks like this with a general lack of intelligence, and they let it go without challenge, like it doesn't matter.
I expect the leader of the free world to be intelligent. Is that asking too much?

Just after I read his damn fool remarks, my mail came.
In it was a well written plea from John Kerry for a campaign donation.
I read it, then wrote out a check immediately.
My heart can't take four more years of this Bush indumbency.

Tuesday, March 16, 2004

Early Survivor Update and Picks

Remember to watch Survivor on Wednesday night this week.

So, where are we?
Last week, we bid a fond farewell to Colby, arguably the most fuckable male in Survivor history. In the hetero hierarchy, I would imagine nothing trumps a big old handsome Texas boy with a big, white smile. I wonder if he has a sister? Ooops, I digress.
The other members of the NoMo Faggo tribe voted Colby out because he was the biggest threat, so it made sense strategically.
Alas, that pretty much leaves their tribe down to stems and seeds:
Ethan: can't untie a knot under pressure, plus he already got his million.
Kathy: left her heart on the yacht Big Tom described as being, "like the fanciest trailer you ever saw, only it was on water." She's now like a cheating spouse. She may be with her original tribe in body, but she's got her mind elsewhere. That other tribe liquored her up, squeezed info out of her like a lime and left her giddy and clueless.
Lex: Trying to lead without seeming like he's trying, and confusing himself in the process. His fangs will start to show once the tribes merge.
Shii Ann: Has successfully managed thus far to show no redeeming qualities whatsoever.
Jerri: Her self-described zenlike approach to the game is hilarious. If Zen involves bitching a lot, scowling like a harpie and being lazy as hell, she's a high holy master.

Then there's the ChapMyAss tribe.
Alicia: That red bikini canceled out that creepy, Greek-style cap she wore on the yacht. I sort of like her the best just for superficial, aesthetic reasons, but she's a strong competitor, even in the water.
Big Tom: Calling a multi million dollar yacht a fancy trailer on water pretty much tells us why giving him a million bucks would cause a global scarcity of lawn flamingos.
Amber: She forgot she's there to win a million instead of finding a husband.
This is no time for estrus, babycakes, but if the previews are accurate we'll get to see her lizard kissing Rob in the next episode.
Rupert: Poor thing. Even his voice has taken on a weird, nasal sort of whiny quality that I find offputting. I wish he'd get his mojo working again.
Jenna: Oh, is she still there?
Rob M.: I think he's playing Amber like a dime store harmonica while he continues to plot and scheme about the money. While I dislike his excess cockiness, I think it may work for him. He may well be the sharpest tack on the island.

I think the tribes may stay separate for one more week because there are still 10 people out there, and that's too many. Or maybe they will merge, who knows?

Anyway-who's out?
Gotta be either Jerri- simply because her zenlike state of grace is too spiritual for the others to behold, or Jenna, because she's so bland I forgot she was still around.
Besides Rob, there are no real power threats remaining. Lex and Rupert have morphed into Beta dogs and Big Tom, well, you know.

Monday, March 15, 2004

The Sucking Abyss of the Campaign News

I've almost reached the saturation level.
Trying to keep track of all the Bush lies and crooked deals is like juggling ever increasing balls.
In a way, I am glad Texas isn't running a bunch of Bush ads.
I am afraid that seeing his smirking face blaming everything on everyone but himself, then patting himself on the back for his strong leadership would make me want to shoot the screen out of my TV.
Eclair and I ate at Benihana on Saturday night.
We sat at the communal hibachi table with a nice family consisting of two Baby Boomer parents, their grown kids and their dates. None were big Bush fans, but I still felt compelled to mention at least a few of his more glaring
shortcomings.
Eclair actually dug her fingernails into my leg when I got on a roll about the idiot. Bolstered by a Tanqueray martini and a snootful of sake, I forged on, undaunted.
Alas, dishing Bush nowadays ends up like preaching to the choir.
On Sunday, I met Eclair's sister, the family matriarch. She too loathes Bush, so we hit it off very nicely.

We all know by now that a train station in Spain got hit hard by Al Qaida terrorists.
We Americans can empathize with our hearts filled with sadness, but it looks to most everyone like Spain got hit because they were one of the few European nations Bush was able to bully or bribe into joining "the coalition of the willing," and commit troops to Iraq.
Reacting with outrage and fear, the Spanish voters ousted their conservative, Bush kissing prime minister and elected Socialist Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero, who has pledged to get their troops out of Iraq, unless the UN takes over muy pronto.
That leaves a coalition of the willing made up of a couple of Polish dudes and a handful of guys from countries nobody's even heard of.

Condaleezza Rice was on Meet the Press yesterday.
How anyone that poised and articulate can spew forth such spin-doctored gibberish with such conviction is stupefying. I bet she has 666 birthmarked on her scalp under that processed hairdo she sports.
She was among the scant handful of women Bush mentioned in his little speech for International Women's Week.
The first woman he praised was Fathi Jahmi, a Libyan government worker who'd been jailed for advocating freedom of speech and democracy in Libya.
Alas, turns out Fathi Jahmi is a man.
Bush and his speechwriters don't even bother to try to get it right anymore.
They throw out any half-assed statements they want, hoping their luck holds out and nobody confronts them.
It's kind of like playing cards with a little kid. You let them cheat without mentioning it and even allow them to win, but eventually it becomes too tedious to tolerate, and you end up just wanting to slap the shit out of them.

Saturday, March 13, 2004

So Many Thorns on the Bush

Gee, I wanted to Blog about something other than Bush today, but after reading headlines from around the nation, there were just too many ripe peaches to harvest.

1. The Bush campaign has about five times more money than John Kerry's campaign to spend on TV ads.
Anti-Bush groups like MoveOn.com are running ads independent of the Kerry campaign, but the FCC is trying to muzzle them.
The FCC has mandated that Kerry's staff are not allowed to participate in planning ads produced by other organizations, so there is no violation of Federal Election rules.
Wait. Why would the nonpartisan FCC try to silence concerned citizens groups who wish to run paid political ads not favorable to one particular candidate?
Hint: The FCC is headed by Colin Powell's son.
2. Bush wanted to address the issue of rampant unemployment plaguing America, so with great fanfare last Labor Day, he appointed a "job czar" to the Commerce Department.
He chose Nebraska businessman Anthony Raimondo, who it turns out fired 75 of his workers two years ago and has plans underway to open a $3 million factory in China.
Once again, Bush has his finger on the pulse of the right thing to do, then does the opposite. I wish for once he'd take the nation's pulse non-rectally.
3. Ever the environmentalists, The Bush administration FY2005 budget released on Monday, Feb. 2, cuts spending on environmental projects by $1.9 billion compared with FY2004 spending. Those tax cuts for the wealthy have to come from
somewhere, I guess.
4. The government's top specialist on Medicare costs told colleagues he was warned that he would be fired if he told key lawmakers about a series of Bush administration cost estimates that could have torpedoed congressional passage of the White House-backed Medicare prescription-drug plan.
What? You mean a government employee who has facts that don't support Bush fiction gets threatened if he rocks the boat? We should tell former Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill about that!
5. Just as I predicted, several GOP senators and members of congress are starting to poke their heads out of the sand and publicly question some of the Bush policies. The smartest ones know they must gain distance from Bush as quickly as they can, lest they lose all credibility with their constituents.
It's getting clear-the GOP's candidate, like his Daddy, will end up being a one-term fizzle.
6. The gay political organization called the Log Cabin Republicans are starting to question whether to withdraw support from Bush, the commander in chief of gay bashing.
Sheesh. They have to be a bit slow by being Republicans to begin with, so being slow to pull their support is just par for the course.
Still, welcome back to reality, you silly queens.

And now, some good news:

By Glen Johnson, Boston Globe:
WASHINGTON -- John F. Kerry, for years branded a loner in the Senate, was embraced with a standing ovation yesterday when he returned to the chamber's weekly meeting of Democratic members for the first time since the Massachusetts senator emerged as the party's presumptive presidential nominee...
...During the meeting of Senate Democrats, Kerry was introduced by Kennedy and Senate minority leader Tom Daschle of South Dakota. Later, New York Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton, who has been mentioned as a possible presidential contender in 2008, was unreserved in her support.
"I think he is communicating effectively and he has a lot to say, and the American people are starting to question these very simple, kind of peremptory remarks that come out of the president that often are not accurate, often don't respond to the issue at hand," she said. "I think they appreciate somebody of Senator Kerry's intelligence and knowledge explaining issues and pointing out how things do work."

Yep. The Democrats have started getting it together earlier in this race than ever before in campaign history.
Bush lied about Kerry's Senate record in his latest campaign ad.
Kerry's campaign produced an immediate response ad, where Senator Kerry dished it right back to him, with resoundingly gleeful support from the public.
The gloves are off, and Kerry seems to have the bigger fists.
Bush is starting to behave exactly like the animal he most resembles, a cornered rat.

Friday, March 12, 2004

First We Came for Dr. Laura...

Back in 2000, Paramount Television was poised to launch a syndicated TV talk show hosted by right-wing radio pundit, Dr. Laura Schlessinger. Famous for comments like, "homosexuals are biological errors," Dr. Laura became a human symbol of hatred, ignorance and intolerance toward the gay and lesbian community.

Tired of rabid conservatives like Schlessinger using the media to foment hatred and homophobia, John Aravosis (a gay activist based in Washington DC) and four of his colleagues founded Stop Dr. Laura.com.

Response to the site was immediate and enormous, with more than 50 million hits logged within the first year. Sponsors of Schlessinger's show were inundated with letters and calls threatening boycotts. One by one, they started pulling away from the hatemonger.

Within one year, Dr. Laura's television show was canceled. She stared the battle but we won the war. Overwhelmed by the success of that grass roots website, John Aravosis and friends recently launched DontAmend.com and DearMary.com Both sites have attracted massive international media attention and have roused millions of gays, lesbians and those who support us to rally against the hatred and discrimination the Bush administration and Republican legislators have directed toward us.

The DearMary.com site was created to send Dick Cheney's lesbian daughter Mary Cheney millions of e-mails asking why the self-proclaimed gay and lesbian activist has sat by in silence as her father has openly denounced equal rights for homosexuals.

DontAmend.com is a site decimated to protecting the U.S. Constitution from the right-wing's regressive, discriminatory proposed amendment to ban same sex marriage.

There is a war going on besides the debacle Bush created in Iraq. This is a civil war, and Bush started it. Bush and his crooked band of liars have stirred the issue of same sex marriage to make gays and lesbian rights a huge issue in the campaign to reelect Bush.Cowed by demands from ignorant, intolerant religious zealots and other ultra conservatives who want to swap votes and contributions in exchange for discriminatory legislation, the Bush team has seized this issue as an ideal way to deflect attention from the abysmal performance of Bush in his first term as president.

See, they figure if people are stupid enough not to notice how many ways the Bush administration has screwed America, those same stupid people are likely to embrace and endorse wholesale discrimination against those who differ from themselves.

But we queers aren't going to take it.Americans who abhor the right-wing attempt to abridge equal rights aren't going to take it, either.

Battle lines have been drawn. Like Dr. Laura, the Bush team fired the first shots when they started talking about amending the constitution specifically to deny equal rights to a large segment of the tax paying population. Like Dr. Laura, they have grossly underestimated their enemies. We queers are veterans of various battles waged against us by intolerant bigots.

Next step: outing closeted queers who work for (or are) legislators who have rallied against us. Roy Cohn and J. Edgar Hoover may have died in their respective closets, but it's time to shine some light in the closets of those gays who've been enabling right-wing fanatics in their efforts to legislate hatred. Like Bush said in his rally against terrorists, "You're either for us or against us."

It's time to choose a side and let the battle begin.
...And we have cuter uniforms.

Thursday, March 11, 2004

Bush Campaign Demands Apology
(Associated Press)

"...Earlier Wednesday in Chicago, Kerry toughened his comments about his GOP critics after a supporter urged him to take on Bush. ''Let me tell you, we've just begun to fight,'' Kerry said. ''We're going to keep pounding. These guys are the most crooked, you know, lying group I've ever seen. It's scary.''

Bush-Cheney campaign chairman Marc Racicot called on Kerry to apologize.
''Senator Kerry's statement today in Illinois was unbecoming of a candidate for the presidency of the United States of America, and tonight we call on Senator Kerry to apologize to the American people for this negative attack,''
Racicot said in a statement...."

Oh, please.
One look, on any given day, at Dick Cheney's Halliburton's price gouging over no bid government contracts in Iraq affirms the lies and crookedness that permeate the Bush administration.
Bush lied about Iraq having WMD's so he could drag us into war. That was crooked.
He also lied about the environment, education funding, AIDS funding, affordable healthcare for the elderly, fixing rampant unemployment, and his military record.
Lies. Lies. Lies.
Bush depleted the budget surplus to reward his wealthy buddies with two huge tax cuts. That was crooked.
Bush is willing to trade discriminatory constitutional amendments for campaign contributions and votes. That's shamefully crooked.
Bush said he was a compassionate conservative when he ran for office in 2000.
That was a lie. He's a right-wing extremist of the worst kind.

Kerry should not apologize for calling the Bush crowd crooked liars. He called it as he saw it, and he saw it absolutely right.

The GOP will be whining and bitching like hell during this election because they cannot dictate the terms of Kerry's campaign ads. Neither can they prohibit independent groups like MoveOn* from running anti Bush ads, independent of Kerry's campaign.
The truth will come out, and the Bush clan obviously will have great trouble accepting the public getting to hear the ugly truth about them.
Having run America like a banana republic dictatorship for the last four years, the Bush regime is accustomed to using spin doctoring, spy tactics, sidestepping, force and threats to get their way, often under the convenient guise of "national security."

I'm delighted to see Kerry has hit the ground running with straight talk about the crooked Bush administration.
This is no time to run a polite, punch pulling Democratic pussy cat against the low-down, shameless, criminal Bush scoundrels.

Kerry needs to call it as he sees it and keep the pressure on Bush.
Bush and his thugs ARE the most crooked liars in modern American political history.
This is no time for using Queensbury Rules and extending civil, political courtesies the Democrats are so famous for.

To get us out of the fucked-up messes Bush has made in his one-trick-pony term, we need a leader like Kerry who isn't afraid to take on Bush and his criminal associates.
If Kerry can face down these GOP terrorists, Arab terrorists will be cake in comparison.

Kerry has come out with the gloves off and fire in his belly.
Please note how swiftly his Democratic primary opponents have rallied to support his candidacy, with funds, personal appearances and lists of their supporters.

For now, we need to forget about dealing with the horrible mess our nation is in domestically and internationally.
First we need a hero to save us from Bush and his criminal associates.
I think Kerry has so far shown great promise in accomplishing that.

Kerry should apologize to Bush?
Ha.
The truth needs no apology.
If they feel libeled or slandered, let them try to sue Kerry.
When damaging allegations are based on fact, it's neither slander nor libel, and those Bush criminals know that. They need to put up or shut up, and stop whining like spoiled babies.

*You know an incumbent is bad when indie groups pay for ads against him. Has this ever been done before? I don't believe it has.

If the ChapMyAss tribe were smart they'd vote off that lippy little Alpha male, Boston Terrier Rob.
Alas, they are not smart. If they were, Boston Rob would have been back in Beantown hanging sheetrock by the third episode.
Remaining Chappers are:
Amber, Big Tom, Alicia, Boston Rob, Rupert and Jenna.
If we lived in a fair world, Bush and Cheney would be in prison taking it up the ass, and Alicia and her amazingly sexy body would win just so we could oogle her every week until the end.
But it's an unfair world. Sayonara, Alicia. Love your upper arms.
Alternate loser: Jenna. Just because.

The NoMo Faggo Tribe still has:
Colby, Shii Ann, Lex, Kathy, Ethan and Jerri.
Ethan is the last remaining million dollar winner, so he is automatically on thin ice. I don't see him bringing in much fish or winning all the challenges, but I do see a big target on his back.
But then again, that trampy Jerri is starting to piss off the other No Mo Faggo women, so she is my alternate choice for getting the boot.

Seeing Colby last night on "Curb Your Enthusiasm," trying to convince a Holocaust survivor that he had it so much tougher as a TV Survivor was so tastelessly funny, I just stared at the TV with my jaw dropped.
I think Ethan, being a Jew and all, may have been a good choice for the Colby role as well.
Larry David has to be one of the funniest men on earth, writing bits like that.

Tuesday, March 09, 2004

Electronic Voting: I Vote No

Oh, come on, a moron could see through this Republican ruse.
First of all, voting by personal computer is wrong because without a paper trail, it's too easy to rig. Let's not let Bush steal another election.
But most importantly, computer voting is like the poll tax of yesteryear, designed to make it easy for the rich to sit on their fat asses in their studys and click a mouse, while the old black lady in the inner city has to get on two buses in the rain to get to her polling place and vote.
Unless everyone in America has an Internet connection and a PC by which to vote, it's inherently unfair.
Sure, it would be more convenient for me to vote online, but I have started to force myself to consider the rights of people who aren't just like me.
I have sat dormant too long, not doing anything about discrimination other than saying I am against it.
The rights of children, the elderly, the disabled, minorities, veterans, environmentalists, poor people, teachers, students, the unemployed and so on are just as threatened by the current administration as my queer, woman rights are.
There us a cultural war on, the rich, white GOP against the rest of us.
They have an edge, using fear tactics and faux patriotism to lure non-rich, foolish voters like certain Bloggers whom I won't name.
Next Tuesday, I hope to attend the precinct meeting that evening and voice my opposition to electronic voting. I invite you all to do the same when you vote in your state's Democratic primary.
Every day until November 7 will be a battle.
We have to win this war.
Let's begin by refusing to allow electronic voting. It's un-American.

I started working out with Willie in August. Scroll down, he's toward the bottom of the page wearing red posing panties.
I work out with him three times a week, and in between I ride my bicycle and do free weights just to keep from being too stiff to work out.
I figured after a few months I'd stop being in a state of perpetual soreness, but I'm not. Just as I get used to the routine, Willie adds weight or reps to make me sore again.
Alas, my polar bear midsection started to become apparent to him once the weather started warming up and my workout clothes became more revealing.
Now he's on to me to lose 2 pounds a week by "nutritional" means. That's fitness-ese for "stop eating so much, you hog."
Yesterday I had my first week weigh-in and lost the two pounds, so he upped it to 2.5 pounds. Can he do that?
After 49 years of free grazing and laying around, this fitness shit is exhausting.
It's like a bad drug. The high isn't that great but it's still addicting.
Eclair and I bought a 10-pound medicine ball over the weekend. We threw it back and forth, aiming at each other's abs, at least 100 times. It's sort of like tossing a padded bowling ball back and forth, just to give you a sense of the weight.
If someone told me last year I'd be spending a Sunday afternoon with a beautiful woman in a swimsuit, throwing a medicine ball at her abs instead of billing and cooing with her, I'd think they were crazy.

Okay, enough fitness.
Now those Satanic Bush lunatics are trying to say foreign dictators prefer Kerry.
So what?
Maybe they prefer trying to negotiate with someone whose NOT SUCH A TOTAL ASSHOLE.
See, the Rove Crowd wants to equate Kerry with evil foreign leaders.
Yes, they are that desperate.
But it's a stupid idea.
It's like saying, "Osama Bin Laden drinks Coke, so if you drink Coke you must have terrorist leanings."
Basically, the Barcodies of the world fall for shit like this. The Rove Crowd takes gullible people who live on hostility, fear and dread and capitalize on it.
Don't take my word for it, Barcodie's over on his commentless Blog spreading the Gospel of Karl Rove.
Hey Barcodie- Kerry looks kinda French!
The French didn't agree with Dubya's rush to war so WE KNOW they are evil!
Let's condemn that dictator's favorite, Kerry, for looking like one of them frog-eating, French faggots.

Monday, March 08, 2004

Waiter Worries

On Saturday, Eclair and I picked up Cris from the airport and ended up at PF Chang's for a late lunch.
As I often like to do, I was playing a few rounds of, "How Much Would You Take?" where I asked contestants Cris and Eclair what they'd charge to eat the whole dish of hot mustard or drink an entire bottle of Chinese pepper oil. Cris said she'd want $50 for eating the mustard, which E. and I thought was high.
The waiter, an adorable, young, ex Marine, heard us and offered to eat the mustard for only $2.
Then he said when he was in the military, he snorted a big line of rock salt, squeezed a half lime in his eye and drank a shot of Tabasco, all for only $165. He said his eye was swollen for a week and the salt screwed up his sinuses for quite a while.
Loving his adventurous spirit but sensing a bit of stupidity, I asked him who he planned to vote for in November. He said Bush.
Naturally, I launched into an autioneer-paced denouncement of Bush, but with the waiter being swamped with other patrons, Cris rolling her eyes and Eclair digging her fingers into my thigh, I had to miss an otherwise perfect opportunity to educate a misguided young voter.
Yesterday, Eclair and I shared a long float in her pool on a double-sized raft. The sun felt warm against our skin, and we languished in that cozy stage between sleep and awakeness.
All I kept thinking about was going back to PF Chang's and getting the waiter's e-mail address so I could begin the arduous process of reeducating him about Bush. I didn't mention it to her because I feared she'd think I was politicizing the tender moment we were enjoying.
But that's what we're going to have to do, folks.
We have to ask who and why, and attempt with all our might to gently remind dormant minds just how many ways Bush has fucked America.
We don't have the money to hire actors to portray NYC firefighters so we can stick John Kerry in ads with them in the background.
We don't have puppetmaster Karl Rove in our corners, showing Bush how to pander to the terminally sentimental.
This is a ground war, my friends.
That's why my otherwise adorable Bush lovin' waiter got a 15% tip instead of a 20% tip.
No sense lulling him into a false sense of economic security, eh?

Friday, March 05, 2004

The Martha Stewart Diary: Sing Sing Prison Bitch

Oh, my.
A jury of my peers (as if) has peered over their inferior quality Walmart reading glasses and found me guilty on all counts, of charges I am certain they have never heard of, much less understood. Peers, indeed. I chortle at the incongruity.
Fortunately, I have had sufficient time to prepare for the trauma of incarceration.
My assistants who currently reside in the facility, ChaCha and Shandalier, have assured me they have made the proper arrangements for my possible stay. I am pleased I had the foresight to put them on retainer well in advance.
I must remember to send them cartons of Kool cigarettes as per our agreement.
Also, my Sing Sing chief of staff, Elizabeth, who likes to call herself "Big Betty," has taken the liberty of giving would-be agitators in the facility a tour of what she quaintly refers to as, "Fist City," in anticipation of my arrival.
I am glad to have this leather-bound, gilt edged journal in which to commit my thoughts during this perilous time in my history.
Fortunately, I had my stockbroker notate a "sell at $20" order on my OmniMedia shares.
Small comfort, that. I lose $30 million for each dollar my stock drops.
I must rest before I resume journal entries, but rest assured, more will follow.
Notes to self:
-Have massive quantities of raw meat sent to my appeal lawyers, posthaste.
-Send hand-knitted nettle and asbestos wool coverlets to federal prosecutors.
-Send black floral arrangements to jury members, along with deceased fish.
-Research how to translate 'fuck you' into Latin for cross stitch pillows to be sent to Court TV reporters.

"WASHINGTON (March 5) - Attorney General John Ashcroft has been hospitalized in an intensive care unit for a severe case of gallstone pancreatitis, his chief spokesman said Friday..."

I guess, with all the gall that guy has, some of it was bound to back up on him.

Scandal-plagued Mexican President Vincente Fox will be spending the weekend with Dubya at his Crawford "ranch."
Gee, two crooks getting together to decide how to rope the Canadians into their NAFTA reindeer games. Or maybe Vincente is just delivering Dubya's cocaine stash so he'll be nice n' sharp for the campaign.

In TV news, Bush is using the tragedy of 9/11 as a backdrop for his first reelection TV ads.
The announcer doesn't mention that not a single 9/11 terrorist has been convicted and Bin Laden is still prancing around, free as a bird.
Bush it trying to persuade us to keep him so he can continue to protect us from terrorists, because we still aren't safe.
If we still aren't safe, why should we keep him?

In the NY Times, Maureen Dowd wrote a brilliant piece where she envisioned ads for Dick Cheney:

Consider the possibilities:

ON THE SCREEN The spot lingers on a shot of the vice president's office door, closed and padlocked.
THE SCRIPT: "Big enough to tell you to butt out. Sensitive enough to know that special interests are truly special."

ON THE SCREEN The spot opens with a tightly focused shot of a headless pheasant, then dissolves into a shot of a big Dick Cheney putting a miniature Antonin Scalia into the pocket of his Elmer Fudd hunting jacket.
THE SCRIPT "Man enough to hunt with all the big dogs."

ON THE SCREEN The spot opens with Mr. Cheney checking his mailbox on Massachusetts Avenue to see whether he's received his annual deferred compensation check for $150,000 from Halliburton.
THE SCRIPT "Big-hearted enough to forgive and forget Halliburton's pesky overcharges in Iraq for oil, and food for American troops."

ON THE SCREEN A picture of Mr. Cheney beaming at his family.
THE SCRIPT "Strong enough to put his base above his daughter and support a constitutional amendment against gay marriage."

ON THE SCREEN A close-up of Mr. Cheney accepting a huge N.R.A. check in his spider hole.
THE SCRIPT "Protective enough to safeguard the firearms industry from liberal potshots."

ON THE SCREEN While the "Pink Panther" music plays, we see a cartoon of the vice president, dressed in an Inspector Clouseau trenchcoat and a false mustache, wandering the desert with a spyglass.
THE SCRIPT "Steely enough to ignore the administration's own intelligence on the absence of W.M.D. and an Al Qaeda connection to Saddam. Farsighted enough to know that one of these decades, the rocks and trash that Iraqis are throwing at American forces will be replaced by flowers and palm fronds."

ON THE SCREEN A doctored photo of John Kerry, his war medals airbrushed out, canoodling with Jane Fonda at an antiwar rally.
THE SCRIPT "After getting four student deferments himself during Vietnam so he could attend to `other priorities,' he's still gritty enough to paint John Kerry as a spineless wimp on Vietnam and Iraq."

ON THE SCREEN A shot of Mr. Cheney driving the Nascar Viagra race car.
THE SCRIPT "Audacious enough to shred the American Constitution, even while he imposes one on Iraq." Instead of speaking at the end to say he approved the message, as Mr. Bush does in his, Mr. Cheney comes on at the end of his spots with a paper bag over his head and says, "It's none of your beeswax who approved this message." Except in one, where a rotund man comes on and says, "I am Ahmad Chalabi, and I approved this message."

Thursday, March 04, 2004

To Hell With Bush- It's Survivor Time!

As many of my readers know, my browser is all but extinct and my iMac operating system and AOL version are hopelessly outdated. Done with procrastinating, I have finally ordered a big chunk of new memory, and sensing that, my little computer is acting like a swayback horse in a dust storm with a stone in her shoe. Still, I've slogged through as many Survivor links as I could to find inspiration in picking tonight's boot-ees.

Last week, the Sorebooger tribe was dissolved and its members were merged into the Chappa-my Ass and Slo-Mo Faggo tribes. The head of the Slo-Mos, gay Dick Hatch, was booted. Good. I'd had enough of seeing his fuzzed out genitalia and clearly visible woman hips. Gay brother, schmay brother, that swishy old faggot had to go!

Logic would dictate the booting of Sue Hawk from Chappa My Ass and Jerri from Slo-Mo Faggo. Alas, this game is not at all logical.
Ethan is the only remaining millionaire winner in the game, so I pick him to go next if Slo-Mo loses immunity.
If Chappa My Ass loses immunity, what the hell, I still pick Sue Hawk just because she peed on that raft. A gal just doesn't pee on a communal raft, it's uncivilized.
Your picks?

Wednesday, March 03, 2004

Hail to the Chief: President John Kerry

The good news this morning, in an AOL poll, if the election were held today 63% said they'd vote for John Kerry.
I like Kerry just fine. He's got my endorsement. Now we have to face an onslaught of slick, mega-million dollar Bush ads.
I'd hate like hell to work at the ad agency trying to make that crooked bastard look good.
Let's guess what his ads will be like. Then let's debunk them.

1. Kerry is anti defense spending and anti war.
The debunk: Bush is pro OFFENSE spending and pro WAR. If he wasn't so eager to start a war with Iraq, we'd be better off today in defense terms. That war was and remains senseless, ill-planned and hasn't accomplished a damn thing in terms of diffusing terrorist threats. The only ones who have gained from that war are the rich, white men who manipulate Bush into doing their bidding.
2. Kerry is a tax and spend liberal.
The debunk: At least he's not about giving huge tax rebates to the rich while spending everything we have, and beyond. If Democrats can leave office with a budget surplus, call them whatever you like. A surplus beats a multi trillion dollar deficit any day.
3. Kerry is pro queer.
The debunk: Fuck you, Bush. Using gays to bait terminally intolerant, homophobic voters is chicken shit. You have no accomplishments to showcase, so you appeal to the lowest denominator for votes. It's weak.
4. Kerry was chummy with Jane Fonda.
The debunk: First, no he wasn't. Second, even Vietnam-era Defense Secretary Robert McNamera came out and said a few years ago the Vietnam war was a bad idea. Third, Kerry served with honor. He had the right to oppose the war, he was there.
5. Bush was a strong leader during 9/11.
The debunk: A chimp could have waved the flag and shook his fist in the air like Bush did. The entire world mourned with us- anyone who led the nation at that time would have garnered sympathy and support.
But where the hell is Bin Laden? Why are we now so hated internationally? How could anyone go from world sympathy to world animosity in such a short time?
6. Under Bush, the nation's rampant unemployment rate is improving. So is the economy.
The debunk: Burger flipping is not a manufacturing job, you big, fat GOP liars. Tapping into Social Security is a BAD idea. So is planning a trip to Mars.
As long as we are running deficits in the trillions, let's face it, the economy is in a state of disaster.
7. Bush cares about children and the elderly.
The debunk: Education funds were slashed for kids. Affordable prescription medications for the elderly? A total joke.
Bush cares about only one segment of America: the rich.

I could go on, but why? Bush has ZERO to brag about.
His foreign policy is the worst in American history.
His domestic and economic policies have been abysmal.
He lies. His people lie. He's even worse than his one-term father.
He's been the worst president in history. He's not just an embarrassment to America, he's a danger to it.

This isn't a time to pussyfoot around.
Send money to the Democratic National Committee.

Tuesday, March 02, 2004

The GOP's Gay Spin: Brain Candy for the Terminally Ignorant

If I hear this one more time, I am going to regrow my ovaries just so I can go on a PMS bitch-slapping spree. I'm talking about people who say, "Well, if we allow gay marriage, what's next, polygamy, marriage to animals, adults marrying kids?"

Attention, you stupid fucks: Two American adults, who pay the same taxes as other American adults, should have a right to identical freedoms and rights. The same stupid types of arguments were used back in the 50's and 60's, when people were voicing contempt for the legality of interracial marriages. "Well, if negras marry whites, they'll have babies and we won't know which-a-way they are."

So? Why does the melting pot of the world need racial purity? Are we Nazis, or what? They said these things, not even considering how backwoods ignorant it made them sound. Polygamy aside for the moment, these people today are so stupid and insensitive they equate homosexuality with perversions like bestiality and pedophilia. It hasn't occurred to them that homosexuality was removed from the perversion shitlist decades ago. They need to catch up with cultural evolution, and stop flaunting their ignorance. And they most certainly need to keep Jesus out of it. As for polygamy, I am neither for it nor against it. It's simply none of my business. Unlike these homophobic dimwits, I don't feel God gave me the right to condemn every adult social situation to which I am not a party. Sure, I have prejudices. I don't think bigoted people should be allowed to breed, for instance. But that doesn't mean I am going to demand a constitutionally mandated sensitivity test to keep the Bubbas of the world from knocking up the Bubbettes.

You know, as a lesbian for more than 30 years, I try to stay current on gay and lesbian issues. I don't recall same sex marriage being such a big issue until recently. You know why? Because I believe the GOP has nurtured a tiny seed of a concept into a huge, poisonous Bushy growth to deflect attention from the miserable mess Dubya has made of the country. By stirring up the narrow minded dimwits and right-wing religious zealots of the country, the GOP is trying to make this a one-issue election, all about uppity queers wanting to get married. The trouble is, there exists a plethora of ignoramus descendants of the opponents of interracial marriage that still buy the idea that discrimination is some kind of divine right. It's not. I don't want to marry a horse. I don't want to marry a little girl. But if I want to legally marry my tax paying, home owning, college educated, law abiding girlfriend, that's nobody's business but ours. Next time you hear that polygamy/beastiality/pedophilia reference, take offense. Say something to educate the ignorant. Be rude if you must. They certainly are, and subtlety is lost on them. Just because we have a dimwit running the country doesn't mean we have to continue to allow his handlers to spread their brand of hatred, discrimination and ignorance like horse manure.

Monday, March 01, 2004

Feeling Vindicated

Whew. Since the Bush debacle began with its stolen election, I have considered it my mission to report on his every lie, regressive policy and instance of corrupt, totalitarian bullshit perpetrated against the American people by this administration.
I have made some outlandish predictions. Most have come true.
· I said there were no WMD's. There weren't.
· I said defying the UN and forcing American troops into war with Iraq would lose us our global sympathy over 9/11 and cast America into the role of war mongering aggressors. I was right.
· I said this war wouldn't be quick or cheap. It's still going on.
· I said the American troops wouldn't be greeted by adoring throngs of Iraqis who consider us liberators. They weren't.
· I said Iraq had nothing to do with the 9/11 terrorist attacks. Other than siding with their Islamic, terrorist brethren against the Christian-based USA, they didn't.
· I said Bush was stupid. He is.
· I said Bush was a puppet for the wealthiest big business interests, with multi millionaire handlers whose sole mission was to get wealthier at tax payer expense. I was right.
· I said the GOP would make gays and lesbians their main campaign issue, turning us into scapegoats to deflect the focus off their criminal, regressive regime. I was right.

I feel vindicated when I read recent headlines from legitimate news and editorial sources around the country. Just the headlines tell enough of the story to give an indication of how many ways Bush and his crooked cronies have been screwing us.